This Man Was Almost Eaten Alive By “Flu”, Now A Tattoo Has Changed His Life Forever HD

It’s a sad reality of life that sometimes the most innocuous of ailments can turn out to be something a lot more serious. Now that the summer is well and truly upon us, people around the world are being urged to heed the advice of experts and stay well clear of tanning oil. To emphasize this point, the headlines have been littered with stories of people whose seemingly innocent spots turned out to be skin cancer. However, few people realize that it’s not just obvious dangers like the sun that can threaten our lives. In fact, it can be something as simple as a common complaint that we can all attest to having multiple times: the cold. For one man, a cold cost him his lips and all his limbs back in December 2013 – a time of year when most of us would brush off the illness as nothing more than a side effect of the weather. Thirty-eight-year-old Alex Lewis’ horrific ordeal began back in November 2013. He claims he had flu symptoms for about two weeks and then one night discovered blood in his urine. Needless to say, this was the first sign that something was seriously wrong. Prior to falling ill, the 38-year-old had been a pub landlord with a fiancée and young son, who had absolutely everything to live for. The day after discovering blood in his urine, Alex’s condition deteriorated further. His limbs had started to turn purple and he had difficulty moving. Lewis was rushed to the hospital where doctors discovered he was suffering from much more than the flu. Lewis had contracted a very rare Strep A Group A Streptococcal Infection, which was progressing to toxic shock syndrome, septicemia, and necrotizing fasciitis – or, in other words, he was suffering from a deadly flesh-eating disease. The odds of contracting this are slimmer than winning the lottery. Within hours, his condition deteriorated as the bacteria took over. He was placed in intensive care and would undergo multiple surgeries to control the spread of the infection. “I was in intensive care for six or seven weeks and was having surgery every other day,” Lewis told the Daily Mail. “Basically, the infection is trying to get to your heart through your body. It starts in your fingertips, your toes and your nose.” While the odds of the infection progressing to the extent that it did in Alex are slim, the infection itself is shockingly common: Lewis’s legs turned black within only a few days and his family was told to say their goodbyes. Doctors performed amputations of all four of his limbs as well as his lips, but it was not a guarantee of survival. Lewis’s infection was severe and he is extremely lucky to have lived. Necrotizing fasciitis, or the flesh-eating disease, is caused by a bacteria that can enter the body through a small cut or scrape. Early symptoms include small red bumps on the skin, sweating, chills, nausea, fever, and rapidly spreading bruising. Shock and organ failure will follow this. The bacteria release toxins that kill healthy tissue and doctors must